Bill Murray Defends His ‘Really Difficult’ Friend Gene Hackman

Hollywood legend Gene Hackman passed away this week and there has been a truly immense outpouring of love for the great actor. There have also been some reminders that Gene Hackman was, at times, not the easiest person for directors and fellow actors to work with. Gene’s friend and fellow industry legend Bill Murray defended Hackman’s behavior on the set of The Royal Tenenbaums and put it into context.

Gene Hackman and Bill Murray worked together on Wes Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) which was, at the time, known to be one of the last roles Hackman would undertake as his career was winding down and he was already over 70-years-old at the time. Wes Anderson has promised Hackman that it would be a “fun experience” working on this film but it proved to be anything but.

There were reports that Gene Hackman was verbally abusive to his co-stars, Anjelica Huston and Gwyneth Paltrow, as we as toward director Wes Anderson. And things reportedly got so bad that Bill Murray intervened, called Gene Hackman out on the behavior, and Murray started working on-set during his days off just to act as a human shield of sorts.

Yesterday, following the passing of Gene Hackman, Bill Murray spoke about his friend and defended him in an interview with AP News. Murray said “He was a tough nut, Gene Hackman. But he was really good. And he was really difficult, we can say it now, but he was a tough guy. Older, great actors do not give young directors much of a chance. They’re really rough on them, and Gene was really rough on Wes. I used to kind of step in there and just try to defend my friend.”

In that instance, ‘my friend’ is referring to The Royal Tenenbaums director Wes Anderson. Murray said “I sympathize with Gene because to him, Wes Anderson was just a punk kid and Gene’s made some of the greatest American movies. So he was a little irritable.”

He added “But he had to work with children, dogs, Kumar [Pallana, who played valet Pagoda], who was like an absolute mystery to all of us anyway. They put him in very challenging positions to work, and so he just felt a lot of responsibility and kept thinking, ‘What am I doing here with these people?’ But the performance he gives is brilliant. And I watched him, and I suffered with him because I saw what he was going through.”

Bill Murray also praised Gene Hackman’s acting skills, saying “Gene would do it perfectly, the other actor would blow it and I’d go like, ‘Oh, God.’ I was watching it going, ‘No wonder this guy wants to throttle people.’ And then he sort of gave an ordinary performance and the other actor got it right and I thought Gene was going to throw the actor off the ledge of the building.”

The full clip can be seen here:

At this point, tragically, Gene Hackman’s death has been deemed ‘suspicious’ by authorities after no sings of a gas leak were found and there was ‘mummification’ of his wife as well.

For more memorable Gene Hackman stories, check out this roundup I put together yesterday on some lesser-known stories throughout his illustrious career.